Alzheimer's Association

Last updated
Alzheimer's Association
Formation1980;43 years ago (1980)
FounderJerome H. Stone
Type Non-profit organization
PurposeEliminate Alzheimer's disease
Headquarters Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Website alz.org

The Alzheimer's Association is a nonprofit voluntary health organization that focuses on Alzheimer's disease care, support and research.

Contents

Its mission is to lead the way to end Alzheimer's and all other dementia — by accelerating global research, driving risk reduction and early detection, and maximizing quality care and support. [1]

Its vision is a world without Alzheimer's and all other dementia. [1]

History

Jerome H. Stone founded the Alzheimer's Association with the help of several family support groups after meeting with the National Institute on Aging in 1979. [2] Stone's efforts began in 1970 when his wife was first diagnosed with Alzheimer's. During the 1970s, there was very little information available about the disease, and only a few support groups existed at the time. Through his efforts, he joined with seven independent groups who wanted to form a national organization. The groups consisted of researchers, physicians, caregivers and other humanitarians. Together, they held their first official meeting on December 4, 1979, to discuss solutions for the need for Alzheimer's information and care and a cure for the disease. [3]

The Alzheimer's Disease and Related Disorders Association was incorporated on April 10, 1980. In that year, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) invested $13 million in Alzheimer's disease research. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan designated the first National Alzheimer's Disease Awareness Week.

The Association is the world’s largest nonprofit funder of Alzheimer’s research and the nonprofit with the highest impact worldwide. [1] It has chapters in communities across the nation, with its home office located in Chicago and a public policy office in Washington, D.C.

The Alzheimer’s Association 24/7 Helpline (800.272.3900) is available 365 days a year. Through this free service, specialists and master’s-level clinicians offer confidential support and information to people living with dementia, caregivers, families and the public. [4] The Association also has free online tools to help people find answers, local resources and support.

The Association believes that engaging diverse perspectives is critical to achieving health equity — meaning that all communities have a fair and just opportunity for early diagnosis and access to risk reduction and quality care. [5]

In January 2023, Joanne Pike, Ph.D, succeeded Harry Johns as Association president and CEO, becoming the first woman to hold these positions in the organization's history. [6]

Events

Walk to End Alzheimer's

Held annually in more than 600 communities nationwide, the Alzheimer's Association Walk to End Alzheimer's® is the world's largest fundraiser for Alzheimer's care, support and research. Participants are encouraged to raise critical funds that allow the Alzheimer’s Association to provide 24/7 care and support and advance research toward methods of prevention, treatment and, ultimately, a cure. [7]

The Longest Day

The Longest Day® is the day with the most light — the summer solstice. The Longest Day participants fight the darkness of Alzheimer's and all other dementia through a fundraising activity of their choice on a day that works for them. With sports tournaments, card games, parties, baking and more, participants raise funds to advance the care, support and research efforts of the Alzheimer’s Association. [8]

Ride to End Alzheimer's

The Alzheimer’s Association Ride to End ALZ® is a cycling event to directly fuel the pace and momentum behind the fight to end Alzheimer’s. Participants in Ride to End ALZ raise funds and awareness to advance research toward the first survivor of Alzheimer’s. Ride to End ALZ offers in-person and virtual events for a range of riders from casual cyclists to avid enthusiasts. [9]

Alzheimer's Association International Conference

The Alzheimer’s Association International Conference® (AAIC®) is the world's largest meeting dedicated to advancing dementia science. Each year, AAIC convenes researchers, clinicians and dementia professionals from all career stages to share breaking research discoveries that will lead to methods of prevention and treatment and improvements in diagnosis for Alzheimer’s disease. [10]

Alzheimer's Impact Movement

The Alzheimer's Impact Movement® (AIM) is a separately incorporated 501(c)(4) advocacy affiliate of the Alzheimer's Association. AIM works to secure policies to overcome Alzheimer’s and dementia, including increased investment in research, improved care and support, and development of approaches to reduce the risk of developing dementia. Working at the federal and state level, AIM advances the public policy priorities of the Alzheimer’s and dementia community. [11]

Alzheimer's Impact Movement Advocacy Forum

The Alzheimer's Impact Movement (AIM) Advocacy Forum is an annual gathering that takes place in the spring in Washington, D.C. The multiday event includes training sessions, celebrity guests, the National Alzheimer’s Dinner, and topical presentations focusing on Alzheimer's disease policymaking and legislation. The feature of the event is a lobby day during which time volunteer attendees conduct meetings with members of Congress on Capitol Hill. [12]

Achievements

The Alzheimer's Association has partaken in many opportunities to assist in diagnosing and treating Alzheimer's disease. In 1987 the Alzheimer's Association teamed up with the NIA and Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical Company (now known as Pfizer) and helped launch and recruit participants for clinical trials of the first drug to specifically target symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. [13] In 1995, the Alzheimer's Association funded the development of a mouse model of a rare neurodegenerative disorder, thus laying down the technical foundation for Alzheimer's mouse models. [13] In 2003, the Alzheimer's Association partnered with the NIA in finding participants for the National Alzheimer's Disease Genetics Study in order to identify Alzheimer's risk in genes. [13]

In 2004, researchers shared their first findings on an imaging agent called Pittsburg compound B (PiB), a major potential breakthrough in disease monitoring and early detection that the Alzheimer's Association provided significant support to. [13] In that same year, the Alzheimer's Association joined in sponsoring the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, a nationwide study that aims to create a standardized method for obtaining and interpreting brain images. [13] In 2005, the Alzheimer's Association launched Alzheimer's & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer's Association in hopes of furthering a worldwide, interdisciplinary exchange within the Alzheimer's research community. [13] In 2008, with the goal of maintaining or improving the cognitive performance of adults, the Alzheimer's Association and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention launched the Healthy Brain Initiative. In 2011, three workgroups brought together by the Alzheimer's Association and the NIA updated the information and guidelines for diagnosing Alzheimer's disease and came up with research criteria to define a new preclinical stage. [13]

In 2015, the Alzheimer's Association led the fight for the Alzheimer's Accountability Act, a revolutionary law that allows scientists at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to submit an annual research budget directly to Congress. [13] In 2018, Alzheimer’s Association released its Dementia Care Practice Recommendations aimed at helping professional care providers deliver optimal quality, person-centered care for those living with Alzheimer’s and other dementias. [13] In 2019, the NIH awarded the Alzheimer’s Association $1.34 million over five years for an international research network, Leveraging an Interdisciplinary Consortium to Improve Care and Outcomes for Persons Living with Alzheimer’s and Dementia (LINC-AD), to improve care and psychosocial outcomes for individuals living with dementia. [13]

Transparency

The Alzheimer's Association transparenlty shares itscommitted to the transparent sharing of governance policies, financial reports and partnership information. [14]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alzheimer's Society</span> United Kingdom care and research charity

Alzheimer's Society is a United Kingdom care and research charity for people with dementia and their carers. It operates in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, while its sister charities Alzheimer Scotland and Alzheimer Society of Ireland cover Scotland and the Republic of Ireland respectively.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eisai (company)</span> Japanese pharmaceutical company

Eisai Co., Ltd. is a Japanese pharmaceutical company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It has some 10,000 employees, among them about 1,500 in research. Eisai is listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and is a member of the Topix 100 and Nikkei 225 stock indices.

The Alzheimer Society of Ontario (ASO) is a care and research charity committed to helping people living with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias by:

Alzheimer’s Disease International (ADI) is a not-for-profit, international federation of Alzheimer and dementia associations from around the world. The organization is in official relations with the World Health Organization (WHO). ADI advocates for people living with Alzheimer’s disease and all other types of dementia.

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a neurocognitive disorder which involves cognitive impairments beyond those expected based on an individual's age and education but which are not significant enough to interfere with instrumental activities of daily living. MCI may occur as a transitional stage between normal aging and dementia, especially Alzheimer's disease. It includes both memory and non-memory impairments. The cause of the disorder remains unclear, as well as both its prevention and treatment, with some 50 percent of people diagnosed with it going on to develop Alzheimer's disease within five years. The diagnosis can also serve as an early indicator for other types of dementia, although MCI may remain stable or even remit.

Steven T. DeKosky is the Aerts-Cosper Professor of Alzheimer's Research at the University of Florida (UF) College of Medicine, deputy director of UF’s Evelyn F. and William L. McKnight Brain Institute (MBI) and associate director of the 1Florida Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center.

John Quinn Trojanowski was an American academic research neuroscientist specializing in neurodegeneration. He and his partner, Virginia Man-Yee Lee, MBA, Ph.D., are noted for identifying the roles of three proteins in neurodegenerative diseases: tau in Alzheimer's disease, alpha-synuclein in Parkinson's disease, and TDP-43 in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal degeneration.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alzheimer's disease</span> Progressive neurodegenerative disease

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and progressively worsens, and is the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in remembering recent events. As the disease advances, symptoms can include problems with language, disorientation, mood swings, loss of motivation, self-neglect, and behavioral issues. As a person's condition declines, they often withdraw from family and society. Gradually, bodily functions are lost, ultimately leading to death. Although the speed of progression can vary, the typical life expectancy following diagnosis is three to nine years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alzheimer Society of Canada</span> Canadian health charity

The Alzheimer Society of Canada (ASC) is a Canadian health charity for people living with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias. Active in communities right across Canada, the Society partners with Alzheimer Societies in every Canadian province to offer information, support and education programs for people with dementia, their families and caregivers. The Alzheimer Society of Canada acts as the national voice for the thousands of Canadians living with dementia and advocates on their behalf for positive change. The Society also funds young and established Canadian researchers working to find the causes and a cure through the Alzheimer Society Research Program.

Avid Radiopharmaceuticals is an American company, founded by Dr. Daniel Skovronsky, and based at the University City Science Center research campus in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The company has developed a radioactive tracer called florbetapir (18F). Florbetapir can be used to detect beta amyloid plaques in patients with memory problems using positron emission tomography (PET) scans, making the company the first to bring to market an FDA-approved method that can directly detect this hallmark pathology of Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) is a multisite study that aims to improve clinical trials for the prevention and treatment of Alzheimer's disease (AD). This cooperative study combines expertise and funding from the private and public sector to study subjects with AD, as well as those who may develop AD and controls with no signs of cognitive impairment. Researchers at 63 sites in the US and Canada track the progression of AD in the human brain with neuroimaging, biochemical, and genetic biological markers. This knowledge helps to find better clinical trials for the prevention and treatment of AD. ADNI has made a global impact, firstly by developing a set of standardized protocols to allow the comparison of results from multiple centers, and secondly by its data-sharing policy which makes available all at the data without embargo to qualified researchers worldwide. To date, over 1000 scientific publications have used ADNI data. A number of other initiatives related to AD and other diseases have been designed and implemented using ADNI as a model. ADNI has been running since 2004 and is currently funded until 2021.

Florbetapir (18F), sold under the brand name Amyvid, is a PET scanning radiopharmaceutical compound containing the radionuclide fluorine-18 that was approved for use in the United States in 2012, as a diagnostic tool for Alzheimer's disease. Florbetapir, like Pittsburgh compound B (PiB), binds to beta-amyloid, however fluorine-18 has a half-life of 109.75 minutes, in contrast to PiB's radioactive half life of 20 minutes. Wong et al. found that the longer life allowed the tracer to accumulate significantly more in the brains of people with AD, particularly in the regions known to be associated with beta-amyloid deposits.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alzheimer's Foundation of America</span> Non-profit organisation in the USA

The Alzheimer's Foundation of America (AFA) is an American nonprofit organization based in New York City whose mission is to provide support, services and education to individuals, families and caregivers affected by Alzheimer's disease and related dementias nationwide, and fund research for better treatment and a cure. AFA unites more than 2,000 member organizations from coast-to-coast that are dedicated to meeting the educational, social, emotional and practical needs of individuals with Alzheimer's disease and related illnesses, and their caregivers and families. Member organizations include grassroots Alzheimer's agencies, senior centers, adult daycare center, home healthcare agencies, long-term care residences, research facilities, and other dementia-related groups. AFA holds Charity Navigator's highest rating of 4 stars.

Aducanumab, sold under the brand name Aduhelm, is a medication designed to treat Alzheimer's disease (AD). It is a monoclonal antibody that targets aggregated forms (plaque) of amyloid beta (Aβ) found in the brains of people with Alzheimer's disease to reduce its buildup. It was developed by Biogen and Eisai. Aducanumab is given via intravenous infusion.

Terminal lucidity is an unexpected return of consciousness, mental clarity or memory shortly before death in individuals with severe psychiatric or neurological disorders. It has been reported by physicians since the 19th century. Terminal lucidity is a narrower term than the phenomenon paradoxical lucidity where return of mental clarity can occur anytime. However, as of 2022, terminal lucidity is not considered a medical term and there is no official consensus on the identifying characteristics.

Geriatric psychology is a subfield of psychology that specializes in the mental and physical health of individuals in the later stages of life. These specialized psychologists study a variety of psychological abilities that deplete as aging occurs such as memory, learning capabilities, and coordination. Geriatric psychologists work with elderly clients to conduct the diagnosis, study, and treatment of certain mental illnesses in a variety of workplace settings. Common areas of practice include loneliness in old age, depression, dementia, Alzheimer's disease, vascular dementia, and Parkinson's disease.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alzheon</span>

Alzheon is an American clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company based in Framingham, Massachusetts. The company is developing medicines for patients with Alzheimer's disease and other neurological and psychiatric disorders.

Lecanemab, sold under the brand name Leqembi, is a monoclonal antibody medication used for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease. Lecanemab is an amyloid beta-directed antibody. It is given via intravenous infusion. The most common side effects of lecanemab include headache, infusion-related reactions and amyloid-related imaging abnormalities, a side effect known to occur with the class of antibodies targeting amyloid.

The National Alzheimer's Project Act is an Act in the United States that was driven by the rapid increasing number of sufferers of Alzheimer's disease. It resulted in a U.S. National Alzheimer's Plan for increased spending on scientific research, care, and public engagement.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) in African Americans is becoming a rising topic of interest in AD care, support, and scientific research, as African Americans are disproportionately affected by AD. Recent research on AD has shown that there are clear disparities in the disease among racial groups, with higher prevalence and incidence in African Americans than the overall average. Pathologies for Alzheimer’s also seem to manifest differently in African Americans, including with neuroinflammation markers, cognitive decline, and biomarkers. Although there are genetic risk factors for Alzheimer’s, these account for few cases in all racial groups.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Our Impact | Alzheimer's Association". www.alz.org. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  2. ↑ "About Us | Alzheimer's Association". www.alz.org. Archived from the original on 2017-11-20. Retrieved 2017-11-21.
  3. ↑ Association, Alzheimer's. "Alzheimer's Association Mourns Death Of Founding President And Honorary Chair Jerome H. Stone". www.prnewswire.com. Retrieved 2017-11-27.
  4. ↑ "24/7 Helpline". www.alz.org. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  5. ↑ "Our Commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion". www.alz.org. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  6. ↑ "Alzheimer's Association Names Dr. Joanne Pike its Next Chief Executive Officer". www.alz.org. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  7. ↑ "Walk to End Alzheimer's". www.alz.org/walk. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  8. ↑ "The Longest Day". www.alz.org/tld. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  9. ↑ "Ride to End Alzheimer's". www.alz.org/ride. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  10. ↑ "About AAIC". www.alz.org/aaic. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  11. ↑ "About AIM". www.alzimpact.org. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  12. ↑ "AIM Advocacy Forum". www.alz.org/forum. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
  13. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 "Major Milestones in Alzheimer's and Brain Research". Alzheimer's Association | Research Center. Retrieved 2017-11-21.
  14. ↑ "Our Commitment to Governance and Financial Transparency". www.alz.org. Retrieved 2023-11-10.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.